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October 2002 Welcome to The CTMA Connector, a monthly newsletter designed to provide news and ideas about the Commercial Technologies for Maintenance Activities (CTMA) program. The CTMA program is a joint Department of Defense/National Center for Manufacturing Sciences (DoD/NCMS) effort promoting collaborative technology development between industry and the DoD maintenance and repair facilities. This newsletter highlights ongoing projects, serves as a forum for promoting new project ideas, and provides other news of interest to the program. Our goal is to stimulate your participation and solicit your input. Feel free to submit items for the newsletter as well as any suggestions to make it more useful. More information about the program can be found at http://ctma.ncms.org/. To subscribe or unsubscribe to the CTMA Connector, send a message to listmanager@ncms.org with "subscribe CTMANewsletter" or "unsubscribe CTMANewsletter" in the subject line. We apologize that some of you had trouble opening the September CTMA Connector. You can access that newsletter through http://ctma.ncms.org/CurrentNewsletter/September.htm Update from our Washington, D. C. Office The Department of Defense appropriations bill, along with the Military Construction appropriations bill, were the only funding bills to be completed before the Congress passed a long term continuing resolution that will last through November 22, 2002. The CTMA program continues to be strongly supported by the Congress and for FY 2003, the program will receive $5.75 million in new funds. This funding will allow us to continue to form new projects at the same pace we have in the past. 2003 CTMA Symposium Mark your calendars for attending the 2003 CTMA Symposium, April 1-3 in Salt Lake City. The theme is "Issues Confronting the 21st Century Depot" and will include keynote speakers from the front lines of depot work, presentations of ongoing projects, and workshops to identify new initiatives. Several new projects resulted from our last Symposium, and we expect the same results next year. Stayed tuned for further information. Ongoing Project News Process Substitution Methodology for Composites This composites projected has been expanded to accommodate increased DoD and industrial participation, provide a better engineering platform and develop a systematic approach for general implementation. The expansion adds a new corporate partner, The Aerostructures Corporation, and raises Corpus Christi Army Depot (CCAD) process control capability to match other DoD team members. Current members will also expand their efforts by addressing procedural issues and completing additional tests to support the methodologies under development. Progress on the current effort has been significant and positive. General Atomics, the supplier of Predator unmanned aircraft used extensively in current military operations, has used the project results to achieve rapid and reliable composites process modification. DoD participants are actively engaged in material testing and process modifications. The expansion builds on these successes. The additional effort will enable all participants to accommodate the procedural and equipment issues identified to date.The expanded project will continue to facilitate processing science methodologies at the DoD and weapon system suppliers. The expansion will add university participation to make the processing science and engineering data available in the public domain.This work will include:
The anticipated benefits of the overall substitution methodologies program include the following:
The NCMS project manager is Chuck Ryan, 734-995-4905. We welcome the following company into NCMS membership and their participation in the CTMA program: Eclypse International Corporation Eclypse International develops and manufacturers automatic test equipment and test instruments applicable to electrical systems integrity. Project Opportunities Cametizing Coatings on Landing Gear Hill Air Force Base (HAFB) hosts the Air Force (AF) Landing Gear (LG) Maintenance and Repair Depot. Stress corrosion failure of LG components is the leading cause of aircraft mishaps. Cadmium (Cd) electroplating has historically been used to provide corrosion protection to the High Strength Steel (HSS) landing LG parts. An alternative method for corrosion protection, Cametizing is a vacuum based process that deposits metal and alloy coatings on internal and external metal surfaces for corrosion and wear protection. There are other PVDS on the commercial market, such as the Ion Vapor Deposition (IVD) system operated at HAFB, but none to date, produces the required coating characteristics to protect the LG from stress corrosion failures, or have the flexibility to produce a multitude of coatings that has been demonstrated with Cametizing. In addition to eliminating a toxic metals, it will also provide cost savings by reducing, or eliminating the more than $200K/year HW sludge disposal cost that is charged to LG users as well as dramatically reduce the almost $2M annual Industrial Waste Water Treatment Plant cost. A draft proposal is available upon request. The proposal is divided into several distinct phases. Currently they are; Phase-1) Engineering and modification of the existing pilot production unit, which is currently configured to produce army gun barrels and must have additional ability to produce landing gear qualification coupons. Phase-2) Based on an anticipated successful Phase-1 including the design and engineering of a production unit, and the necessary fixtures for application of the qualified Cametized coating(s) to the major landing gear component geometries. Cametizing of LG components will be carried out.in laboratorys and field-testing of components will be conducted in accordance with appropriate ASTM/MIL standards. A successful outcome can lead to additional work to commercialize this process for a wide array of applications from turbine blade coatings to small, medium, and large bore coatings for Air Force, Army, and Navy gun barrels utilizing coatings of titanium, tantalum, and other high performance materials. If the Cametizing process is of interest to your organization and you are serious about mitigating pollutants contact Gary Burkart at 612 839-4567. or gburkart@charter.net.
Non-Destructive Evaluation/Non-Destructive Testing (NDE/NDT) Based on our experience over the past decade in the research and development of testing and measurement devices, NCMS and some of our members have identified a gap in the technology maturation process that is currently preventing the adoption of new technologies in the manufacturing plant. NCMS is currently assessing the need from within industry and governmental activities for an objective third party, with no vested interest in specific testing and measurement devices, to deliver objective test and performance reports to manufacturers, developers, licensees, etc. for purpose of establishing market confidence in NDE / NDT and other measurement devices. We would like your feedback. The testing and evaluation center would · Evaluate NDE and other test and measurement product performance claims; perform characterization testing· Identify Regulatory/Certification requirements (UL, CDRH, etc.); perform readiness evaluations· Evaluate repeatability, reliability, maintainability and durability· Evaluate product capability on actual or simulated end user applications· Evaluate user friendliness and effectiveness for the intended application environment: user interfaces, user manuals, reports and data outputs generated by device, peripheral interfaces, graphics, etc.· Identify needed development, material, component, software weaknesses; recommend changes, modifications, rework· Perform maturation engineering: incorporate engineering and material/component improvements, generate production-ready prototypes· Perform manufacturability assessment and engineering: generate engineering package, bill of materials, schematics, diagrams, photographs, lists of alternate materials and components, test reports, etc. needed by potential commercializersWe would also like your input. 1) Do you perceive a need for such services? Would you find such a center useful in transferring your technologies and inventions? 2) Would you use such a center for prove-out or "adaptive engineering" of technologies for your manufacturing applications prior to purchase for your factory floor? 3) Any other input or suggestions you would like to offer. Please contact Constance J.S. Philips, conniep@ncms.org, (734) 995-7051. Calendar Event Don't forget to attend the DoD Maintenance Symposium and Exhibition, October 28-31 in Reno, Nevada, "Maintenance - Turning Logistics Resources into Readiness". Further information and registration can be found at http://www.sae.org/calendar/dod/index.htm New Project Ideas (click on topics to see descriptions)
We appreciate your feedback. Please contact Chuck Ryan with suggestions or input on other topics that would be of interest to you in this newsletter. The CTMA Program is sponsored by the Department of Defense; the content of this newsletter does not necessarily reflect the position or policy of the government; no official endorsement should be inferred. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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